How Death Challenged Her
by She who poisoned with Thyme
Summary: Andromeda never expected it. But it came anyway... Like it says; how she copes.


How Death Challenged Her.

* * *

My Boy Builds Coffins... Florence and The Machine.

* * *

"_...We are sorry to report that the following people are deceased;_

_Carrie Bladdering._

_Jona McTerbish_

_Thomas Stand_

_Theodore Tonks-_"

Andromeda dropped the radio.

She heard the thing smash into hundreds of pieces, heard the tinkerling of glass as it trickled to the ground. She felt the tiny pieces inbed themselves in her barefeet, felt the pain that followed.

But none of it mattered.

It seemed to ironically aweful that she'd hear of his death via a radio station, and somebody who had never known him. Or at least never known him as well as her. Nobody had known him as well as her. She could have dealt with it, had it been Nymphadora who'd delivered the news.

But it wasn't, it was a radio station, reporting the deaths so far.

And Andromeda, for the first time in her life, broke.

Tears fell, hands clenched, and her body collapsed to the ground, into the pile of glass. It cut into her, but Andromeda couldn't care.

Not once, not once, in her bleak exsitance, had she broken so thoroughly. Not when her parents had announced that she would be marrying. Not when she'd disobeyed their wishes in her Seventh Year had Hogwarts, and lost her virginity as a rebellion. Not when her parents had found out about her rebellion, and the persistant Hufflepuff who wouldn't give her up. Not when she'd found out she was pregnant in the middle of a war.

But that was because he'd _always_ been there. He was the shoulder she cried on, when they'd randomly met in a coridor, and she confided in him. He was the first and last lover she ever took. He'd proposed when she'd been disowned.

And he'd reassured her when she was carrying. It wasn't meant to be this way.

Nymphadora was finally having her own child. Her husband, maybe not the most desirable man/wolf, was loving toward her, but he wouldn't be enough. Remus took his strength from Nymphadora, Nymphadora took her strength from Andromeda, and Andromeda took strength from her husband. The cycle was broken, and there was no way to fix it.

He was gone.

And Andromeda sobbed, for the first time in years. For the first time since she'd met her Ted. Andromeda was practical, unlike her daughter(she'd gotten her whymsical nature from her father). She knew there were going to be sacrifices.

She just hadn't understood how many.

* * *

"They are gone."

Andromeda stared at the boy, young man, standing on her doorstep. His appearance was rugged, clothes bloody, his face was tear stained and eyes redend. But he looked at her with determination she'd never seen on him before. It was the determination her cousin had had before he'd passed through. The boy was more Black than he realised, Andromeda contemplated. She knew she was avoiding what he'd said, but she couldn't cope with it.

"Andromeda. They're dead." The boy repeated, but Andromeda seemed to be in a dream. Her eyes glazed over, already red from crying at the possibilities, and Ted's death, and she strode back into the house. The boy followed.

She sat at the table, still dazed, and was surprised that no tears had come yet. "Both of them?" She asked. Because she'd known who he was talking off since he'd appeared.

The black-haired boy nodded mutely. She could see his eyes, beautiful green, like Nymphadora's on the day after her birth when it was becoming apparent what she was, stared at her. They'd changed after a second, but Andromeda always rememered that because she'd never seen eyes like that before, or since. _Until now_.

The boy was expecting her to break down, publicly, infront of him, in the same house as her grandson? She was a Black for a reason.

"Mr. Potter. Take Ted with you." Potter started, obviously not expecting that in the slightest. "You are his Godfather, and I am not fit to care for him at the moment. I will see him when I am more collected later."

Andromeda knew herself. She knew that the moment the restrictions were taken away, she would loose control. It was best not to test the boundries of her control.

Potter seemed to understand. He left her sitting at the table, to collect Ted.

Black's, because she was a Black as much as she'd like to deny it, reacted to grief with anger. And anger was what turned Andromeda's red, once the door closing signified the house was empty. Ted was gone, leaving her alone. Nymphadora was gone, taking with her the last shredes of Andromeda's sanity. And Remus, despite how much she dissapproved of the union, had taken with him the last bit of fondness.

She was completely and utterly alone.

So Andromeda screamed.

_My boy builds coffins from hammers and nails.._

_He doesn't build shapes, he has no use of sales..._

_He doesn't make tables, or dressers, or chairs..._

_He can't carve a whistle 'cause he just doesn't care..._

_My boy builds coffins for the rich and the poor..._

_Kings and Queens have all knocked on his door.._

_Beggers and liars, gypsies and theives..._

_They all come to him 'cause he's so eager to please..._

_My boy builds coffins, he makes them all day.._

_But it's not just for work, and it isn't for play..._

_He's made on for himself, one for me too.._

_And one of these, he make one for you..._

_For you..._


End file.
